Aaron Hicks schrieb:
Your water is a little hard and pretty alkaline. Your paphs and
phrags probably enjoy it.

Stuff with smaller, finer roots won't take to it well, based on
the hardness. A lot of it depends upon what you're trying to grow.

Your best bet would be to batch prepare your water; add your
fertilizer, re-check your pH, and maybe throw in some Epsom salts
(magnesium sulfate) to help wash out some of the calcium carbonate buildup
now and again with a little ol' cation exchange. Do you see any root tip
burn as it is?

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-AJHicks
Chandler, AZ


Hi, Aaron! Have you been lurking, or do you just seem to sense when a
water question comes up ? ;-) Thanks for answering.
Actually, not much root burn. It seems to affect my oncidiums the most,
I guess. The ones exposed to air turn brownish black.
If it is hard and alkaline, would a certain type of medium help? I was
reading that article on Phals by Alan Koch that Sue Erickson was kind
enough to find for a few of us (Thanks, Sue and a big hug!) and he said
that it is beneficial for the Phals to put dolomite lime and magnesium
into the sphag they use to bring the pH up. So, seeing as I am in the
middle of the Dolomites and our water comes out of them, maybe sphag
would be the medium of choice for me? (Until I get a greenhouse and an
RO system??!!)
Which media would be a worst case scenario for hard water?

--
Reka

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